Chasing the Suns

Flight

I didn't dream, mercifully.

Instead, I awoke just a dawn's first rays were beginning to creep into the recess.

My instincts were off, and I groggily sat, trying to discern the cause of my unease. The alcove was still empty. All my belongings were still as I had left them, tucked inside my bag. I started rolling up my bedding, scanning the little cave as I did so.

Just as I was about to shake the feeling off as jitters, nerves, I glanced at the entrance.

My heart leapt into my throat as I took in the little figure in the jagged entryway.

I watched the boy, the boy watched me.

He was maybe eleven suns old, half my height, with long black hair, reaching down to his waist. He was barefoot and bare chested, dressed only in a pair of brown cotton trousers.

His eyes were a strange blue-grey, almost matching the sky that framed him, and I felt like he saw right through me.

"Are you dead?"

His soft, high, reedy voice showed none of the surprise that I felt at seeing another person, let alone a child, so high up here.

I'd heard of clans that lived in the wild places but had never considered they may be just above our heads. Could they have knowledge about the attack on the Abbey? Could they be responsible?

"Are you dead"

He asked again, slightly more insistently.

I managed a jerky shake of my head. The little boy looked almost disappointed.

"If you're not dead, why are you here?"

"I'm trying to help my friends. Someone attacked them, in that building below us. Can you help?"

"No. Nobody would attack the witches. Too dangerous."

I didn't know that word, or what it meant. I felt the urge to resist it, thought, to insist that we were guardians. I'd just decided against it, when another figure joined the little boy. This one was taller, a man.

Dressed similarly minimally, the man had long blond hair and the same strangely coloured eyes. Unlike the boy, who seemed curious about me, this man radiated aggression and watched me warily.

"Who are you?"

His words were stilted, as if testing the taste of them for the first time.

"My name is Leta. I come from the Abbey below. I'm looking fo-"

I man jerked the boy back, away from me pushing him out of sight, and muttered something in a language I didn't understand. I stood, holding my hands out, trying to soothe him, but the sight of my tattoo only seemed to stir more fear in his eyes.

"We will not help any witches. Leave. Now."

There was that unfamiliar word again. But unlike the boy, who had used it with caution, like a secret, this man spat it at me, like an insult.

"But I-"

"Go!"

From behind him, he pulled out a wicked curved knife, which he levelled at my throat. Shouldering my bag carefully, making no sudden movements, he edged me out onto the ledge.